FEAS Board Meeting - June 9, 2025 (No audio available for first 15 min due to technical issues.)

001Can the school contact them to address the serious nature of these crimes? What protocols have been followed? I will say that the lack of followup and commutation [Music] creative writing or things that she expressed and she did say she's excited about one of the offerings next year that has to do with a novel um put foreign language into the early elementary curriculum. When I was a elementary school student here at Frankfurt, we had Spanish that floated into the classroom and I really really would love to see that again for my kindergartner. Great. Thank you. Give me my letter. I don't know if I made enough copies though for everybody. [Music] Thank you. any other [Music] I will. So, I'm Vicky Slater and I live at 911 Beach Street and I have a sixth grader and

002I think I've already reached out to several of you and this has been um a concern this year about uh sixth grade just the transition of um our students coming from level learning. I think this is kind of speaks to what Brooke was saying that in our elementary school has been really focused on a new writing curriculum and implementing that and then our students going from fifth grade um into sixth grade and they're used to level learning where we have our reading groups and our math groups. So I think it was a a challenge last year. I'm not sure. But for this year, um, our students going into just, um, speaking of my particular student into language arts, um, uh, not feeling that he was challenged and and only getting through a portion of the

003curriculum and, um, and I have spoken with, um, Mr. Sleton about this, so we've already talked about it. Um, I think what we're hoping for is that a really good, um, look at how we approach sixth grade and going into seventh and eighth grade and keeping all of our levels challenged. Um, so I just think it's I think you guys have already had workshops maybe about this about writing workshops and curriculum and all of that. So I just wanted to share again that we're hoping that next year either we have some opportunities or some level learning where everyone can be challenged. Thank you. Thanks. [Music] Thank you all very much. Obviously, you are welcome to stay. Um, and there's another opportunity at the end for public participation and we will also not be offended if

004you elect to go home and do other things. So, but thank you very much. Please know you have heard [Music] Uh, first order of business official approval of the final operating budgets for 25 the stream that is okay. Uh, yeah. On your board agenda, we're at 6.1. We are at 6.1. And as Amy mentioned, this is the approval of the final operating budget uh for 2024, and it's in your packet on page 19. And there's also a resolution to follow that we'll get taken care of um later on. So once again, Heather, thank you for being here tonight and and walking us through the budget. We spend a lot of time on the phone talking about budgets, so thank you for your patience. Uh it's recommendation of FES superintendent that the budget resolution be approved

005for the 2024 2025 general election food service preschool debt retirement and in internal accounts. May I get a motion to approve the recommendation? So moved. Liz, I second it. Second. Any further discussion? All those in favor? I. Any opposed? Great. The resolution passes. Okay. Uh, next one is approval of the resolution acceptance for the 2526 tax appropriation. All right. That's 6.2. And Aubrey, it looks you get to be the lucky signer on these resolutions at the end of the meeting. So, this is 6.2. And this is the resolution of the 2025 2026 tax appropriation, also known as the L4D29. And once again, Heather did a uh presented this and thank you. And this is for 2025 2026. And this is one of the reasons we need to push through this meeting tonight is because this

006information needs to get to uh the townships and the counties because we only do summer tax collection. So that's kind of the pressing matter here. It's the recommendation of the FAS superintendent the 2025 2026 tax appropriation be approved according to the L4029 document that was presented at the FAS budget hearing. I'll make a motion. Liz makes a motion. A second. Scott seconds. Any discussion, questions? All those in favor? Any opposed? Great. The resolution passes unanimously. And last but not least, 6.3, approval of resolution of the 2526 general fund food service preschool debt and internal accounts budgets. Once again, Heather presented this earlier this evening and thank you. It's the recommendation of the superintendent that the budget resolution be approved for 2025 2026 general education food service debt retirement preschool and internal accounts. I'll make that

007motion. Liz and Brian, any discussion? All those in favor? I I [Music] audience march musical. If you didn't have a chance to see that, I'm sorry you didn't have a chance to see that. It was really, really something. And thank you to a host of people. Uh Sue took that leadership role, Sue Hammond, and then of course people at the theater just knocked it out of the park. So, thank you. As I said, we're closing out 2425. Um, pretty busy. And congratulations to our retirees, Dave Baressie, Chris Holland, Dale Towns, and Marty Shabbazi, and Mike Harrington. And I I know we'll have an opportunity to say thank you to those people before the end of the week. But on behalf of the district, thank you very much uh for lots of years together. Uh, prefer

008preparing for 2526. Uh we have some meet and greets coming up uh with some openings that we have available. Uh we're working on finalizing the master schedule and which has not finalized quite yet but very close and then teacher assignments. And then congratulations on the following page are 2025 Hall of Fame inductees. Um and I want to obviously congratulate all of those in the letter. Uh Kathy Pablitz who is no longer with us. Kyle Klein, Josh Mills, West Blizzard, awesome, and Mike Prattley. So, there'll be some festivities on Friday, September 19th, and lots of communication between now and then. So, congratulations to that class of inductees. Then I'll be out of the district the 23rd, June 23rd through July 7th. And Trune law notes, this was a good one. And um some of them are

009This one has lots of information as it typically does uh this time of year. So I'll try to take any questions and try to answer those the best I can if you have any. I already asked all nine. Does anybody have any? Okay. All right. Good deal. Anything else? I am set if there are no further questions. Thank you. Any questions? All right, moving on. Oh, we just lost um finance committee. So, uh I don't have a handout for you guys for finance today. Um we spent uh as Jeff mentioned a couple of different meeting sessions talking pretty much exclusively about the budget and I wanted to share some short comments here for the group regarding the budget. the presentation. I thought Heather did a great job as always. Um uh but just to give

010uh sort of a sense about the things that we were discussing in our in our committee. Um I think the the primary reason for the extended discussions around the budget, which in past years has been a pretty easy discussion, is that for the first year certainly of my tenure on the board, we're going to have a decline in revenues for the school. Uh as Heather mentioned, about one and a half percent. So year-over-year, all things taken into consideration are the the revenue, the money that we receive to run the school is going to go down. Not down as a percentage or whatever, but like it's just going to be a lower number. Uh and that's very unusual relative to the way that that budgets have worked and revenues have worked in the past. Um, over

011the past four years, I went back and looked uh 2020 uh uh 2122 versus today, just to give you guys a sense about what we've been living through, whether conscious or unconscious about it. Uh that's about when I joined the school board. So, as far as I know, this is how schools work. Every year you get a lot more money and everything's pretty easy. Um we h So, just to give you a sense about this, um revenues have grown by uh 26% over that period of time. Over four years, the amount of money that we received to run the school has increased by 26%. Not per year, but in total. So that's a lot over a short period of time. Um local revenue, which is the revenue which we primarily derive from our uh uh

012property tax base, has increased by 31%. So even greater. So we've had a run of extraordinary uh increase in sort of net revenue receiving from property tax, which is very fortunate. Um many of our expenses has have kind of kept that pace like the the per the budget the line item you see there for total instruction increased by about 27% from four years ago to the budget for next year. So kind of on par. Um inflation has hit other parts of our budget during these past years. We had a lot of inflation. So some numbers uh increased uh in different rates but overall we have happily as we look at this position we're in now uh where we're looking at a deficit for this coming year. Um we have managed to maintain a lot of

013the excess funds that we received over that period including not only the revenue increases I mentioned but also as we know significant funds from ESSER and significant one-time funds from state budgets for reasons that I don't totally understand um but they happened. So, a lot of that excess cash that came into the school has been saved in the form of our fund balance, which, you know, looking at last year was becoming sort of a large number. I haven't been a schoolboard person for that long and I've never been an administrator, but my general understanding of how fund balances work is they're like a rainy day fund in the simplest of terms. It's a piggy bank and sometimes you put money in the piggy bank. This coming year, we're going to take money out of the

014piggy bank. And what we spent a lot of time in the finance committee looking at is well okay so we're going to take some money out of the piggy bank this coming year to use my very simple analogy. Um what happens the year after that and the year after that and the year after that. As we all know uh piggy banks can become empty. And so we spend a lot of time looking at potential forecasts and possibilities for the things that we can uh that we can that we can predict or we can't predict but we can kind of estimate things like property values things like state revenues. Ultimately, the revenues that we receive as a school are completely out of our control. Uh we can't control what a house costs in Frankfurt. We can't

015control what the state government and the people who we elect to the state government decide to do in terms of school funding. Uh we just take what they what we get and we try to do our best with it. And so what I would say as I look at a budget for the first time in my time which shows a negative number in terms of our end of the year, you know, we're spending more than we're receiving. We're running at a deficit, which for me is an uncomfortable thing just as a person. Lots of reasons to be positive and happy that over the past couple years we have socked away a lot of cash so that we can run a half a million dollar deficit and not really in the budget as as Heather discussed.

016You didn't hear any major cuts. You didn't hear any major changes. We're be we're able to operate as normal even in a meaningfully different environment financially. That's great. and that's purely a function of having the money saved away. I would also like to sound a word of caution for all of us as we go forward from here. Um, property values increasing revenue from property values increasing by by property taxes increasing by 31% over a four-year period cannot last forever. Um the state declined state revenues declined by something around 400,000 last year to this year which is primarily the cause for the deficit. Um that the new number for this year 1.8 million is still 63% higher than what the than the money we received from the state in 21-22. So we feel like it's a

017significant decline. We're 63% higher from them than we were four years ago. And also we see this in small ways. Service costs uh continue to increase. I'd call attention to something in the board packet where the ISD is asking us to increase the amount that we pay them by 6% this year and 6% next year. Our revenues are down this year and they're asking us to pay more this year and more next year. We get hit by those things big and small kind of throughout the system. Um, and some of them we can control and some of them we can't. So, I'm generally optimistic that the and I hope I speak for the committee here. Please, Liz and Amy, chime in if I'm off on this this opinion part. I think things are going to

018be okay. And I think we're going to be able to move levers around to get back on balance with whatever the new reality is as we as we see over the coming years what happens with property values, what happens with state revenues, what happens with federal funds that we receive. uh we have a lot of flexibility because of our large fund balance to keep things going over a period of time while we sort ourselves out with whatever we're handed. Um and um and I would just like to remind us all four years of happy days financially is kind of a long time and you kind of get used to it. It's human nature, right? And I'd like to remind everybody that there there are these these the there are I think as I mentioned these

019reasons for caution and to be aware as we make decisions on spending that we need to be looking for the long term and making sure decisions we make today are sustainable in ways small and to my comments about the food service budget earlier and and in large. Um and so um let's please be conscious of that as we go as we go on. Happy to take any questions and Liz and Amy, please chime in if there's anything else you'd like to add from the committee's perspective. Well said. Thank you. Sounds good. Any question? I'll just add that what Heather had said about um the the $500,000 really kind of came out of nowhere and we didn't know about it until a week ago. Uh or was it this week? No, a week ago. Last week.

020Last week was the first that we had heard about this. Um, and it's just uh a reminder that we very much are at the whim of other powers um to withhold money. I mean, state revenue is 20% of our overall budget and for them to just knock off half a million is um definitely a blow. Not something we can predict, not something we can plan for. Um but we were very, as Brian said, um fortunate that we had a fund balance that can absorb something like that in the meantime. But it's, you know, we will do our best uh in fiscal stewardship, but there are going to be knocks, there are going to be surpluses, there's going to be deficits. Um, we'll roll with them as best we can. Is there something to the fact

021that we're doing 1.36 this year instead of 1.5? That's that's uh for those are that's to support the bond funds which are which are That's okay. That's different. They're a different set of books different the the things we're about to talk about long range planning the construction projects those are those are they are it's like two separate entities and they don't cross so there's money there's operating money which is what we're discussing here and operating budgets and then there are bond projects and they you you can't they don't you know can't move money from one to the other all right any other questions or thoughts for finance committee great moving on to long range planning Okay, you guys at the end might have to share. I made 10. Um, so long range planning committee has

022been quite busy as well these past weeks. Um we are in the background uh uh working on um finalizing what we uh our goal for this year was to which was to create a 10-year plan, an infrastructure plan for the district on a 10-year basis so that we would look out over the next 10 years. We look today, pick out all the projects we might want to tackle in the next 10 years, try to put them on a schedule, try to figure out how we fund fund raise to to build this different stuff, uh, and put that all together in a bow and say here's the 10-year plan. We're working on that. Um we have become a little bit sidetracked over these past weeks because we are working on some nearterm long range plans uh

023which particularly focused on the high school grounds project what we're calling sort of more broadly here the high school grounds project trying to tie together everything that we've been doing there and hope to do there and I wanted to give a short update on how that looks. Um so uh uh we're not going to ask anybody to vote on anything here. We have some projects that we're looking at very seriously. We in in partnership with Jeff and Frank are trying to get things into a state that we feel is ready for everybody to be excited about. But I want to give you a preview. Okay. Okay. So the picture on the front basically the grounds project what we're tackling is the following. The track is is done and is wonderful and I think that's probably

024why the girls did so well this year. Don't you agree? Absolutely. So there's a return on the investment here guys. Okay. Um there I I I I didn't put it in a dotted line. There is more to be done on the track, particularly around entrance and pavilion and seating, but generally we're I'll come back to you with a final version there. We're talking about in this in the parking lot project opening up a new entrance with a nice paved entryway and then turning the keys over to our intrepid fundraisers and boosters to say, "All right, guys, where do we go from here?" because we spent a lot of money on this track in my opinion and I think we've gotten it to a really good place. There's still some stuff to do but the urgency

025is off and from a beautifification standpoint it looks great over there and we're able to host regionals and we're able to host regionals and there will always be requests for more stuff and better this and better that but I I think we've gotten it to a pretty good place relative to where it was one guy's opinion. This the blue area is the parking lot. So, as everybody is aware, and we have voted and approved, and they're going to start digging soon, we are going to meaningfully expand the parking lot in the high school, uh, adding something on the order of 70 or 80 parking spaces. Um, and also reorganizing things, resealing things, restriping things, basically making it look like a new and much expanded parking lot, which will have the benefit of removing all that

026awful scrub lakey land that just looks terrible. But also more critically when the when we have events on at the school, people can park in organized parking in a safe parking spot with striped pedestrian walkways, designated spots for teachers, designated spots for students, and it's going to be like again one man's opinion, the way a parking lot for a school should be. That is underway. Um the green areas down below. Now we're moving into areas that we're going to propose sort of final plans for soon. Uh we are working on a plan to turn the basically it's a three-part plan. The buses will have a designated place to park. They will no longer park in that grally junky area. The grally junky area will be converted into a grassy field. So that whole area there

027below the school which we own but we kind of don't use because of the gravel will become a park. Um the out building that I've circled in green which I hope you haven't looked at it up close. It's not great. Hopefully that goes away and the storage is moved somewhere else. And then in the dotted red areas there, these are the areas that generally that we're considering for the location for a new storage building that we hope to construct. Uh which will be alongside bus parking on a on a on a paved, you know, organized parking thing. So that's the map. Let me run you through the the details on the next page and the potent the ballparks on costs here and then happy to take any questions. Again, this is an update. We're not

028asking anyone to vote on anything. Okay, track facility check. Uh, information signs. I should have put that on the map and I apologize. I think that's a big upgrade. Got a lot of positive feedback about the information signs. That's part of this big overall project. Parking lot expansion. In total, that's going to that's going to cost well 257,000 or so. I I had to combine some lines here. That's about what we approved for the actual like digging and cementing and paving and stuff for the parking lot. Um, and lighting is in a sort of appro approved position. I think it's it's approved. It's approved. Okay. Uh, and then we have, as I mentioned, this add-on at the end where um sort of on the map up at the top of the parking lot kind of

029by the track storage building, there'll be like a paved entrance there. And that'll all be done um as one piece. Um, and then the second area here is are all those other boxes. what I'm call broadly the grounds reorganization. Um reclaiming significant lands in that park for use by athletics and the community. Um adding a dedicated storage space. Uh and continuing our overall beautifification project to make the school look like something we can all be really proud of. In total, those ground reorganization projects we estimate it coming to something around $340,000. Aubrey, again, these are all bond fund monies. Got not operating fun. Got it. Now, um the largest the largest piece there is a storage building and I wanted to give some comments on that, but you can see the other numbers for what

030it takes to turn gravel into grass and and some other grass into a parking lot and all the other moving dirt around and uh and also um we have a plan to to to to plant an estimated 25 trees throughout the property, which I'm excited about. specific locations to be determined, but things like on the the 11th as you come up to the school, we have trees on the right. We have trees on the right and trees on the left perhaps in front of the school. Yes, Wes. Well, go ahead and then I'll I just want to add to that. Okay. Okay. Well, go ahead. With the trees, um if we could work with the city. No, no. or or plant it wild like we're doing all the down on the street and pull that

031whole pull it in from the city as part of the city. That was some of the inspiration for this, I think. So, it'd be nice to talk to them and figure it out. Uh to have a consistent feel for the town. Yeah, I think would be great. And also the budget here, this is a ballpark. Uh we're also hoping that somebody somewhere is who does this kind of stuff is going to raise their hand and say, "I'd love to donate some trees perhaps." So, we're going to work on that as we go. Um, but that I think is an an important long-term element for for this on the storage building. I want to talk about this for just a moment. So, the the proposal that we are going to present later uh formally is uh

032for a storage building which is about 3,000 square feet. Um it's like a pole barn construction is the idea. So, this will be a separate building. Uh, different aesthetic than the school, not bricked, you know, as you see, as you see around. Some of them don't look great, some of them do look great. We're going to try to make one of the greatl looking ones, obviously. Um, the need for this building is actually, it's been super interesting working with the administration on uh on the need here. Uh, we have, it turns out that Jeff and Frank did a detailed survey of both school buildings and poked around and opened closets and went down hallways and tried to measure with a tape measure uh, precisely how much stuff we have in storage that is not really

033in storage spaces. Did you know? I did not know. There's a girls locker room in this gym here that is completely unusable because it's full of desks. I think apparently it's hard to even open the door. So, it's certainly not usable as a locker room. This hallway we know behind here is full of just stuff kind of that doesn't really have any other place to go. Uh in the high school there are a couple of rooms that are not storage rooms that are not suited for storage that are storing old records. Uh not records but papers papers and uh uh and the more you look around, the more you open doors, the more you find stuff just stuffed places kind of. Um the estimate from from Frank and Jeff uh is that this is the

034right amount of storage space. Actually the estimate is the right amount of storage is something like 2200 square f feet. We asked them to increase that by 30% for future proofing. The notion of the storage building which will be partially cold like not heated and partially heated is that we will have an organized clean uh single space where we can store all this stuff and get it out of other parts of the school which we can use for other purposes which was one of the biggest things in the survey that we had 35 staff members complete. Um, we gave it to everyone, but we had about 35 to 40 staff members who completed it. And one of the biggest things that people said was that they needed more storage or more room, not for storage,

035just more rooms in general. So, this helps to free up some areas and it was one of the biggest things that came through on that survey. Precisely. Precisely. So, so, so, uh, we're excited about this as as a a meaningful upgrade at I mean, $290,000 is a lot of money, but relative to some of the numbers we've seen for adding even just renovating rooms inside the building, this is a this is a relatively fair price in in my opinion. Um, so what we're the reason we didn't come here with a specific proposal for you guys today to like vote on to do this stuff, um, really twofold. one, we're very busy with budgets and other things recently. It's been a busy schoolboard time. Um, but also, we haven't yet finally come to an agreement on

036the right place to put this thing. And given all the work we're doing and trying to make everything look beautiful and organized and right, uh, we wanted to take a little bit more time to really think through this and come to you guys, uh, with with what we believe to be sort of a nice long-term thing that will work for the school and something again we can be proud of when we pull up and and and drop off our kids. So that's uh what I have on that. Uh Liz and Norby, tell me if I've forgotten anything critical here. Uh but again, wanted to post you guys and answer any preliminary questions because the hope is that in a couple of weeks, we are coming to you guys asking to like to do this or

037some version of this. Thank you. And this looks like a lot of work went into it. I'm sure a lot of people contributed to that work. So thank you for that. Um just to clarify, this is like the short term of the long term, but there are other long-term projects that like elementary school and you know, we're not ignoring Oh, no. 100%. Yeah, we're working, as I said, in the background, we are working on our 10-year plan. Uh the reality is so we have approximately approximately $400,000 in the current bond series that is not yet allocated to a project. Um, and the things we've already approved are are not they're already allocated. And there are other things that we haven't approved like new carpeting in the high school and additional IT upgrades for Mr. T

038in the future. Those are allocated, but there is an amount of money that we have that's unallocated. It is not a very large amount amount of money relative to what it takes to do construction projects. It's approximately $400,000. We on the committee thought that this is a super useful uh item. It ticks a box that a lot of people identified as needing to be ticked and we happen to have the funds available today to accomplish it today, which is why we're bringing it up to to a near-term long-term plan item. But yes, absolutely. And so, not only does it help to tick a lot of boxes that people have said, but also it ends up being I think was $15,000 cheaper if we do the like we already have AJ's out here doing leveling for

039the parking lot project. And so if we're able to get them to do that at the same time, it saves us. I didn't even put that in, Aubrey. Yeah. It's going to be $15,000 cheaper than this if we do it now. Great. But yes, and that that's that that's um what they call mobilization, which is basically dragging all the earth movers and stuff over here. If we send them back and then two weeks later they bring them back over, it's a big waste. There are other interesting savings like they're going to use the gravel that they scrape up as the foundation for another building, like recycling it instead of us buying gravel. So, there are reasons to try to get this done as part of this project. Uh, we're going to see. We're we're continuing

040to work hard to try to get it all put a bow on it and bring it to you guys for uh for a vote. Great. Any other questions? When did you want to do that? Well, we have to do it very soon. Very soon. I think we have a meeting in a couple weeks, right? We have a meeting next week. Um, special board meeting that hopefully some of more these things things will be approved. Um if we have to go one more just to make sure this is on the docket. Tomorrow I have a meeting with um Frank and I have a meeting with AJ's to review the parking lot one last time just to make sure we're all set. We also have a meeting with Grand Travers Construction to look at the wellness uh

041project inside the building. Can't turn your mic on. Oh, sorry. There you go. I'll start over. Thank you. Um so yes we have a meeting tomorrow with AJ's to review the parking lot and meet with all the contractors and we have talked about this as you as we all know at the long range planning committee. So we will have to make some decisions fairly soon um as far as placement and we're going to move forward and all of those things. The other piece um that we're working on the wellness p uh project that's pretty much that's in place ready to go. uh the contractors just going to come through one more time because that's going to start as early as mid next week. And then the other piece just so you're aware as we said

042there's other things in the loop here. Um I want to talk about at our next meeting uh senior hallway carpet. We've had some conversation with that at the long range planning committee. Uh we've talked about library furniture. We've quite a while ago. I brought that up at a board workshop quite a um man maybe back in March or February and we're working on some library furniture and uh through her work has garnered $100,000 grant that's primarily for books and refurbishing of the library and then looking at some different furnishings. So all of this is in the budget but we do need to have another conversation. So ASAP we're working our butts off to try to get this all put together. It's a lot of moving pieces but we're hopefully soon. We'll let uh Frank and

043I will after our meeting tomorrow, we'll put some thoughts together again and then we'll call our group together and hopefully be able to come back next week or if we need to do one more short meeting just so if this as Brian said, if this doesn't stay in sync, then we lose some opportunities. Yeah. From swapping gravel one spot to black dirt the other spot and shell game almost. So, but recycling. Yeah, it's very exciting and it's good to take the time to get it right the first time. Oh yeah, go ahead. Middle school street. We I Go ahead, Brian. Okay. Uh we the new the parking lot changes are are instead of that. So, uh that drive was for a couple of reasons. There were some plans around egress. We're maybe going to close

044Hall Street and be able to egress to the north. Um uh but what we what we've done with the new parking lot design is that um the the place most people will be parking in the new area which is not going to be in the loop. So teacher and student parking is going to be in a separate area. So the loop parking it's going to be like it's not finalized yet but like primarily visitors which at pickup and drop off time shouldn't be so crowded. So hopefully some of the congestion there will be relieved. Uh and then also from a safety standpoint which was the other reason to potentially have be able to exit straight out. Um, we are we, as I said, we're putting in dedicated walkways that are striped with signs and stuff

045so that the crossing points are more organized versus now it's kind of a free-for-all. Um, and then the last thing that I don't know if you've noticed, but you know, part of that was related to buses and bus drop offs. And the bus drop off now happens in the back of the building. So, the congestion and the confusion and potential safety hazards that were from buses spinning around that thing, we've we've made we found another solution for that which is I think working well. It is. It is. My bike's on. It is working well. The other piece uh Brooke with that part of that congestion is because of it's the tightness between you have the island parking and then the other side and you have to squeeze through there. The parking lot design is almost

046doubled that width. So, and we're going to change some where people can park so you have more room to get around that corner. So, we're not it'll it'll be much better. All that wet land that's like next to the track in between the track and the parking lot, that's all becoming parking lot essentially. And you're not gonna be allowed to park on the curb anymore. Okay, good luck with it. Okay, any other questions? I heard that, Wes. Uh, great. Thank you again. Any any other questions, guys? Thank you for putting all that work in. Yeah, good job. Technology report. No report today. No report. You're just excited to collect all those Chromebooks and what we as parents are excited to try to find wherever the mouse went. Well, oh no. Oh, good. I have to

047find it then. Great. Are we going to be selling any more iPads at the end of this year? No, that's only four years. Great. All right, Mrs. Gualtney. elementary school. I want to present a report to all of you. It's been a really good busy really exciting month here and um some some of the highlights have been day tomorrow. We had the musical musical which was absolutely fantastic. Um lots and lots of field trips. I told you some of the places that we've gone lots of incentive trips. Um it's just been a really great but really really busy month. So um I would like to say thank you to Mike Harington our custodian who is retiring on Thursday the last day of school and he's served us really well. He does everything throughout the pandemic.

048He was here um all of the all of the time. I would come in in the evening and he'd be here cleaning the walls and he'd be doing everything so that our building was really in great shape when people came back to school. So, I just want to publicly say thank you to Mike Harrington for um being such a great dedicated employee for us and um we will miss him. We will miss him. Do you have any questions for for me about anything? I was just going to add that video on that website. Oh, great. That was awesome. It was a packed house, too. It was. Um, any questions for Ann? Um, in here you mentioned how Gwyneth and Cooper were mentors. Is that something that started this year? Like that is like a new

049sort of Are we planning to expand that anymore? I know that we had talked before about having more y old kids mentor little kids and I didn't know if that was something like it was this pilot pro project and this was this was a project where our school counselor uh Relle Croft identified a need and then she reached out to Patty and the two of them worked together to try to do this. Yes, we are planning to do this again. Yes, we are planning to expand it. In a perfect world, we'd be able to identify a mentor who's a ninth grader so that every year we'd be able to continue this. Um, in reality, the schedule of a junior or especially a senior has a lot more flexibility. And so, um, the really cool thing

050is that at least one of those mentors is planning to work with their mentee a little bit over the summer, even though they have graduated and are heading elsewhere. So, um, the the people that were chosen to do this were exceptional for the the job that we gave them. Um, one you can probably understand was girl drama. So, you can figure out who we called in for that. And then other was a a couple of boys who needed a ball and um it worked out really really well. Um, they were ideal people to build those relationships. That's great. Any other questions? Uh, I think you mentioned the incentive day. Um, uh, looking back on the year, this is the first year for that, right? Correct. Thumbs up, thumbs down. Did it work? Um, if you

051guys remember what this is, the um, kids who don't get you, you can. Yeah. So, what we did this year was we had a behavior incentive. students who were able to not receive any office discipline referrals were given some special thing and we had a whole variety of things that we did over the course of the year as incentives and I'll share data with you next week um at our meeting but uh our behavior uh ODRs were down by about twothirds this year so and I've been meeting with all of my staff members this week all of my certified staff and I'll be talking with the non-certified staff and all of them felt that it had a positive benefit. Now, there's some things that are difficult about it. Um, and we're going to try to

052see if there's some things that we can tweak it a little bit. Um, more information to come on that. I've been working with the elementary leadership team to talk about that. That's been a topic of conversation uh at every meeting. Um, it's been really nice to honor the kids who can do it. Um, for the kids that it's harder for, it's been a real victory when they have earned the incentive. Um, and it's been a challenge when they haven't made that particular incentive. And that's a struggle for students, for staff, for their parent, for the children's parents. It's it's a challenge for us when that doesn't happen. And so we're we're working on ways to make that better. But we've we've had a lot of fun creative things that we've done. It's great. And overall

053twothirds decrease is remarkable. Remarkable. Remarkable. Great work. Yeah. It's unbelievable. And do you feel that difference in the building? Is it? Yes. Yes. It's been there has been a real improvement. Last year at the end of the year, we got together and we we identified things that really needed to change. And two things that we identified were student behavior and we identified um uh our child study process. And those two changes that we made have have been very positive for us this year. the um the discipline referrals that's hard because no one wants to see a child not earn something and that's really hard because everybody here cares for students. We want to include everyone. So that has been a challenge but I do think that overall has been positive for our building. Overall, it's

054been positive for our learning. And in talking with teachers about year-long pacing and things like that, we even with tense snow days, we were able to accomplish more this year in most classrooms. Based on my unscientific survey of the third graders with whom I interact, uh the incentive thing has penetrated to them. They pay attention. They want to be good. They want to go on the trips, which is cool. Very cool. Okay. Any other questions, comments, Brian? Thank you. And uh thank you for a great year. I mean, one week left. So, three days. Yeah. So, I am quite confident that it's a exhausting time of year. So, thank you for It's exhausting, but it's energizing. Yeah. So, but thanks for being here and for sharing that update. Um Matt, middle school, high school update.

055I also submitted a report and just as Ann uh started hers that you know shout out to our retirees Chris Hollandbeck um D Townsen, Marta Shabbazi and Dave Baressie. I mean they've been with us for a long time. Um Marta loved her so much came back for some extra time uh after she retired the first time and uh those are all um great employees that we're really going to miss that uh provide a lot of opportunities for our students. So um we're going to work hard to try to get some great people in uh for those uh replacements. Um, I submitted my list. Um, you can I'm not going to read it for you. It's, as Ann said, exhausting is a great word, but also energizing. Um, you know, we're it's been a whirlwind for

056the last couple weeks at our building. And, um, you guys know that every year is the same. I mean, when we get towards May and then everything starts. I mean, from proms to, uh, class nights to graduations to extravaganza, you name it, there's something going on. So, a lot of people make those uh, things happen. And then uh try to mention as many as possible in the in my report. And then um if you go all the way through like it lists all the activities, but then also um we had some trips uh just uh since our last board meeting. And then um our kids are taking exams starting tomorrow. They'll have two exams tomorrow, three on uh Wednesday and two on Thursday as they finish out the week. And then summer school starts right

057up next Monday um for credit recovery for high school. our middle school summer school will take place uh at the end of July in the same window that um elementary is doing. There's and then I included kind of a snapshot of our what our seniors are doing on the last page. So if you want to take a piece there there aren't names tied to it, but at least it's a kind of a idea of what some of our kids are doing going into the uh going into their year after um graduation. So great. We had 36 this year and um one of the uh numbers that's in there uh 34 of the 36 made it to the um project grad to the all night party which was pretty awesome and they all stayed till like

0582 a.m. So which was awesome as well. So it was pretty cool. So it was a safe night which is the goal and uh each and every year. And then right now we're trying to finalize schedule stuff. um our new hires. Um we got interviews coming and so it's just a matter of putting the pieces together to make sure we can provide as many opportunities for our kids as we can. How many do we know yet? How many kids are doing summer school at both schools? Is it comparative to previous years? Do we not quite know yet? There's still exams. I know. That's why I was wondering. That's why I'm wondering. So we we don't have exams. Um, we have put out invitations of between 8 and 12 students per grade and we are still

059getting responses back. And so right now we're sitting at about six to eight per per grade. Um, but we will be looking at that and then adjusting how we're going to approach it depending on the final number of responses. And when does your guys' start? It starts July 28th. Okay. and goes until August 14th. Yeah. Okay, cool. Yeah. And for the high school, I mean, we sent out last week, we sent out or well, a week and a half ago, um people that are on the line, you know, you know, possibly, you know, your student had a year or below. We just said, "Hey, heads up. You might need for credit recovery." And um we'll see how things turn out this week and um try to get them in next week. Can we do a

060two week intense try to get re, you know, restore some credit for those kids that need it? And then the middle school is not uh it's invite. We'll have 30 kids invited. And I mean last year we had I think 26 total participate which was which was a good number. So great. Any other questions? And again thank you Mr. Stapleton. I know you go above and beyond and had one saw you the day after the senior allnighter and you had yet to go to sleep. So that's right. Yeah. Thanks for uh keeping on. Great. Any other questions? We're good. All right, Bella, tell us about your high school experience this past month. Yeah, busy, busy, right? Um a lot of senior stuff. They got out of school and we had the graduation and all night

061party. That was a lot of fun. Shout out to all the people that put that together. Um obviously exams are this week, so that was a little grind. two and a half days. Not that I'm counting, but um what else? Spring sports, track, had a great season. Um boys baseball, girls softball that finished. And then golf, um I don't think anybody made it to states in that, but across town, Michael Hudman won, so shout out to him, too. There you go. From Glen Lake. Um AP exams are all done. There was the band concert, the extravaganza of student council had a little end of year party and then the next school year's 26 27 executive board was elected. Um, Interact had a no phone Friday last Friday and they handed out some donuts if you

062turned in your phone and um there was a gift card drawing at the end of the day which was I think a lot of people did it. So yeah, that was good. Sentiment around that. H what was the overall sentiment around that like of why they did it? No. Were they How do people feel about doing it? I didn't like I feel like people just turned it in and were happy they got a donut. So I think it was good. A little easier this year than prior years, right? Because this year you weren't supposed to be using your phone during class time anyway. Yeah. So I think it wasn't really that different. I don't know. People really people only use it during passing time. So, that's about it. Um, and then I did want to

063say if anybody has any volunteer opportunities, feel free to contact me or Emily Stevenson because NHS kids are always looking for those hours to get in. So, great. Awesome. Any questions for Bella? Wonderful. And Bella, it's exam week. If you would like to leave, you are more than welcome to leave. So if you want to stay for our business stuff that is good too but we would understand. It's totally up to you. Thank you. All right moving on. Business discussion approval to of a custodian hire. All right we have quite a few but these are pretty typical at this time of the year. So it should go fairly quickly I hope. Uh this is approval of a custodial hire mainly from the uh retirement of Mike well not mainly from the retirement of Mike Harrington.

064Um so with Mike's retirement and thank you to him once again we do have a vacant uh custodial position Frank Iikens and uh Corey Leotart uh Frank had discussed the position with Corey Leotart and Corey also had an opportunity to do some substitute work here for us which was all kind of helpful kind of trial basis. Uh this will be a full-time position. It's a year-round position in accordance with the FAS support staff master agreement. So, in talking with Frank, uh, it's our recommendation to approve the hire of Corey Leotart for a full-time year-round custodial position. Make the motion. Wes, a second. Megan, any discussion, questions? This No, it's a replacement. Custodial staff. My god. Um, five. Five. Is that right, Barb? Five within the district. I guess we'll get back to you on that.

065It Well, it's hard because, you know, we have summer work to go through and so forth. You know, we had a lot of space. Seem to be doing okay, but it they're they're working hard to get it all done. But we'll be back to you on that. What building will Cory be in? Uh, most likely this one, but we don't we're not 100% sure. That's going to be up to Frank to make that decision. And I know a lot of times we usually put on there pending all the background checks, but are those There would be Yeah, I'm sorry. Pending the background checks and I believe we're all set. Yeah. Okay. Thanks, Barb. Great. All right. We have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? All those in favor? I Any opposed? Great. All

066right. Our welcome to Corey. Our next item is the approval of the athletic training services agreement and Adrien Jones from Paul Oliver Hospital met with our finance committee on May 5th to go through the jobs and responsibilities of the athletic trainer had some data on things that have h taken place within the last year. Uh the biggest difference with the reason this has increased basically double is because as what happens with grant funding at times the hospital lost the grant fund and they're asking us to do 100% pay uh due to the loss of that grant funding. Trevor works about uh 192 hours a week a year, excuse me. Probably feels like it. um is pretty much in line with our school year, but he does have some flex time for summer activities. So, as

067you can see, the rates of the contract for 25 26 26 27 27 28 and and working through that and having some conversation with the finance committee. It's the recommendation of the superintendent and the finance committee to approve the three-year athletic training services agreement with Paul Oliver Memorial Hospital at the cost stated above in the summary section by the years and the cost. And Trevor again sent out some data today. Uh it's really helpful to have him on board or to have a trainer. So that's our recommendation. And Matt, can you remind us what percent approximately what percent of our student body in middle school and high school participate in athletics? Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I I think a fair statement would be not all kids do three sports, but the percentage of kids who

068are participating in some form of of an athletic team, it's between 65 and 70. I'm sure it is. Yeah. Across 6 through 12. That's huge. Amy, I have a question on this. So, so, so, um, in light of the budget discussion we had earlier and to my earlier point about these costs just these costs seemingly arising for us that we don't seem to have a choice about. I I'm in support of the trainer. I think it's a great program. It's been great for the kids. The presentation that they gave to the finance committee was very compelling. Um, where was do we know where the grant money was and how do we get it back and like h I don't love just taking on another 25,000 that we didn't through Paul Oliver's um foundation is my

069understanding. Yeah. Um it was a private donor. Is that your recollection? I believe so. to be honest with you, it's been a little bit, but yeah, it was through a donor and then we lost the grant funding or they did for that that portion. Um, I will say, Brian, I yes, but this has been figured into the budget, so it's in there. But to your point, I understand that, but to our point and with our kids and our coaches, it's it's an important position. No, I think it was also tiered, wasn't it? where it was like it was like the first year they paid for all of it and then the next year we like like a few years later we paid for part of it. It I think it was always meant to it

070was it meant at some point it was going to be 100% pay on us that we wanted to continue and and we're at that point. Yeah. So we did know that we knew. No, no. I I I know we knew and but again the budget picture is very different this year and perhaps years going forward and these these are the kinds of things that I think were were easy before and are now like we have to I was I was just trying to answer your question. I think the grant isn't available anymore. I think it was always meant to be titrated down. That's not to say that we can't proactively go out and search for grants that could offset this cost or some other cost within the district. Yeah, for sure. That's something given our

071situation with budgets we're going to need to pay better attention to. Right. These these are the kinds of supporting services that are super valuable to a lot of our students, but that also are the kinds of things that become, you know, on the bubble if if if deficits continue at half a million dollars a year. Yeah. You know, and so I'd like if there are opportunities to find ways to help out with this one in particular. This is a great luxury for us. you know, this is an awesome thing for us and it's it's great that we can do it. And I think anymore and I should have that data, but I don't. Um I think pretty much most districts do have a trader now. They do. Yeah. Five years ago that was not the

072case. We were one of the pioneers here and at Benzy like because of this grant because Paul Oliver had it with both schools. But yes, I think that now and by back then we were one of the only ones like but five to eight years. I think the data was compelling. It's been a great thing for our kids. So, I I would say that like an option to look at in the future would be potentially, and again, I don't, you know, this isn't the answer, but I'm saying like there's a potential of asking the coaches to like fundra as well. Like, and again, I'm not saying that that's the end- all beall, but they are fundraising for other things, right? And so, like, there's a potential that that could be Let's just keep it on

073our radar. would obviously be better. I'm voting for this one. I think this is an amazing program. I love it and it's, you know, these are the kind of costs that that have my antenna up. Does that sound like a motion to approve? I'd like to make a motion to keep Trevor. He's great. Great. May I get a second? I'd second that, Megan. Any further discussion? All those in favor? I. Any opposed? Great. The school calendar. All right. School calendar. That's that's in your packet. And Mike Tyworth, thank you for putting that graphic together for us. And Mike's also working on some graphics for uh parents to be sent home at some point once this is approved. Um so we've had the conversation as we do yearly with our association members. They help look at

074the calendar. uh we've put the calendar in line with Northwest Education Services and the ma main reasons that is due to winter and spring breaks but also if you get away from that then that interferes with our students attending CTC. So we do need to keep that in sync and that is uh recommended by our ISD but it's also if you don't do that you have to go through the state to change that but for us for our students it's it's a better thing to do. So, it is recommended by the administration agreed to by the FAS Education Association that we move to 7 uh 12:30 p.m. early release Wednesdays during 202526 school year and that we approve the calendar that's presented. How many early release did we have this year? We had eight or

075nine. I think we had nine and we lost one or two one or two to snow days. And the year before we had like double that. we had more and we we've tried to look at it differently. The association's been great helping with look at um staff development days early on and then making sure those seven days and it's kind of how they fell in the calendar too. I mean we really tried to honor parents and if we had two days off in like half days such as in October for parent teacher conferences then we didn't do one in October. So we we tried to line it out where it was, you know, taken into account for parents, but also taken into account as a district, we feel strongly we need the time to do

076the work. And that was going to be my question is you guys feel like because I know that it was quite a change this year from last year and you guys felt like you still got what you needed to get done in the in the in the amount of days that you had that were half days. Yeah. Yeah, I think so. I mean, of yeah, you'd love to have more, but we also have to look at what's realistic and what's and and I I totally understand that we have to take into account for our parents as well. What are the two in January, the two early releases that are so close together? I see it's end of first semester and then uh January would be uh the 23rd is the end of the semester. That

077would be a a 12:30 dismissal for students. teachers stay on. The 28th is an early release day at 12:30. Do we have to have them so close together? Well, they were tough to to put there uh Brian simply because we're also coming off of winter vacation for two weeks. So, we didn't want we wanted to give kids the opportunity to get back into the swing of things and then uh use those days. That's why we put it there. Not ideal, but that's the only place we could find it this year. And you couldn't move the early release date, the Wednesday one into February or something. Well, once again, then you're two days off in February as well. So, we're we're just trying to balance that out. And the other piece, to be honest with you,

078the way it went last year with the amount of snow days we had, we're trying to kind of stay out of that zone a little bit because that was difficult. Just a curiosity, how was attendance in the elementary school this last week? Good. Okay, great. I mean, ice cream. So, I know my kids here really and truly illness, right? Did you guys get that? Great, good, good. Um, just a process formatting thing. It is so much easier to read this colorcoded version as opposed to circles and triangles and squares. Um, also these pop out much more. If there's any way we could spring for a color copy of this calendar, it would be impactful. It's your budget to aging eyes. You know what? I make a motion that we have color copies. I think we

079put it on a color PDF and if people want to print it off in color or look at it, their phones, man. Yep. Y that's fine. just do it in color because even the one the other one is circles and squares and Mr. Tyworth is using some of his many creative juices to try to figure something out. So, we're well aware that colors are nicer to to deal with. Thank you. [Music] mention here is um it would be nice and this might be an opportunity to work with our ISD and other districts to see if everyone's facing the same challenge which I have heard anecdotally that they are that a lot of times we lose students the day or two before vacation or the day after and maybe if we shifted the days off so

080that it was like you could get the cheaper flights on a Thursday versus a Saturday. But we all have to go together. We all have to do it together. But um but that is something that I think would be nice to have our ISD play a role in doing what's good for the families. We got spring breaking. Yeah. No, that that we did that last year, didn't we? Two years ago. Two years ago. Yeah. I I think in theory that makes really good sense and I appreciate that trying to get everybody on board. I will my guess is the the sentiment will be wherever you put the day people will go earlier if they can but we I'm happy to the the ISD sets out a regional calendar for a fiveyear period. Happy to bring

081that up. Yeah. I mean I'm just saying if that's that's the excuse I've heard from parents is like hey it's cheaper to fly on these days. It gets really expensive to do it on Saturday. So, I don't know. Then you take the excuse away at least. You're right. We might get a different excuse. I don't know how to answer that. I don't know. Okay. Uh, so I will make a motion to approve the 2526 calendar with colors. With colors. Uh, Megan or Wes will let him. Hall of Famer West seconds the motion. Any other? Yeah. Yeah. That's too hard. Yeah, it's a possibility. Good comment. All right, motion second. Any other questions? Comments? All those in favor? Any opposed? Well, there you go. Make your vacation plans in color. All righty. The next one is

082our traditional approval resolution to be a member of the MHSA for 2526. I'm so moved. Okay. Any discussion? All those in favor? I. Any opposed? Did you get that, Barb? I totally missed it. So, who? Okay. Liz Lockheart Field Contract. All righty. Uh there's also Barb has the official uh copy board secretary for you to sign. Got it. All right. Thank you. Uh Lockheart Field. I talked with Andrew Johnson who oversees that uh for many years and does a wonderful job. Uh there is a cost change, but I did go back and research in 232 24 there was not a cost change. So we had a freeze for a couple years and then he's asked to move it to an to a $1,000 increase. And I asked him why and he stated it's it's cost

083changes like everybody else. It's the operating costs. It's the the maintenance uh to keeping the field in great shape. It's the turf management, utility services, and so forth. So uh that was the reason uh for the for the contract moving to 18,500 with the understanding it was froze for frozen for a couple years as well. So it's the recommendation of the superintendent to approve the signing of the contract in the amount of $18,500 for $500 for 2526 school year. So moved. So this is again just like it's this is a $1,000 increase. It's about 6% increase. Yep. In a year when our revenues are down. If we don't say yes, is the field just less fertilized or what what happens? What use is it? We don't own it. We can't use it. We don't own

084it. It's a contract with the It's a contract that we've carried for many years. FAA and thus the city. Okay. Put it another way. If we said, "Listen, we'll just do a little bit less work. We'll pay you what we were paying before. I don't think I'd hold up this contract. I'm sort of trying to make I'm just trying to make a little point. I'm not being annoying. Understand your point. We We would wave these things through, you know. Well, I will say that when I started on the board, I think it was only $11,000. So, it has gone up. That was like 20 years ago, Audrey. Right. But were there cars then? But and so it has gone up. I remember a couple years where it went up quite significantly and I was wondering

085back then and I was told it was because it hadn't gone up in like the previous 10 years or something. But it if it didn't go up last year that's fine but I do remember it was going up about $1,000 a year for a while. I think I think if we were the school district actually pay for I don't have any idea if we own that. I can say to you that I think it's a good deal. It's a very good deal. I understanding Brian's point, but you know, it's it's a it's a tradition in our community. Um, it's been here forever. It's one of the best grass true grass fields that we that anyone plays on. Uh, so it takes a lot of pride to do that. I think the other thing they've put

086in, they've invested a lot of money for new bleachers. Um, so yes, I it's unfortunate, but I think it's a reality, but it's a really good deal for us. I was gonna I guess echo the same thing. I think if you were to cost out that facility with press box, lighting, energy use, all of it. I I truly think we're probably getting a deal at 18,000 a year. Yeah. I mean, I I know that's the upfront cost, but then there's maintenance to all that and replacement to all that. And sometimes, you know, it's like when we talk about renting a van versus buying a van or we talk about, you know, this is just a bigger scale. It it seems pretty reasonable. I think you're right. And I think everyone agrees with that sentiment, but

087I also echo Brian's sentiment that we need to be aware of how all of our expenses are creeping up going into next year when our revenues are going down for the first time in a long time. So just your friendly finance committee is just going to keep doing our job and going that's an increase, that's an increase. Just to you know Yeah. The next the next one is worse than this. The one we're about to talk about is worse than this one. Yeah. But that's enough about Lockhart. So moved. Liz makes the motion. Do we have a second? I'll second it. Brian seconds. Any other discussion? All those in electricity. Yeah, we pay the electricity. Okay. Thanks, Barb. That's what I was. Thank you. It's good. All right. Okay. Liz and Brian. Brian. Any other

088comments, questions? All those in favor? I. Any opposed? Great. Yeah. All right. Our last item for tonight as far as business. Anyway, this is our two-year agreement with Northwest Education Business Services. Uh we've been in an agreement with Northwest Ed for many, many years. Uh we've had the opportunity to be with Heather Sauls for quite a few years and your interaction tonight you can see her value. Uh she I think it's important to understand that she oversees a team of four of three different people Barb three different people. Um so what we're paying for is a team of people that have expertise with federal grants budgeting um and and the list goes on. So when I I want to make it clear that when we look at these contracts or agreements, it's not just for

089one person. It's the team approach that the ISD needs to be able to pay for their staff as well. So with that said, the contract amount is 78,500 plus mileage. You paid quarterly for 2526. The the second year is 83,500 with mileage. Once again, this is a two-year contract. And yes, it is an increase from last year. Um, and I totally understand where people are coming from. I think we continue to need to have our radar out. But I will say, um, from my point of view and the working relationship that they provide for us, this also is a good deal for us even though there is an increase in cost. So with that said, it's the recommendation of the superintendent and I assume the finance committee because we've had conversation about this that we

090continue with Northwest Education Business Services for 2526 at a cost of 78,500 and 2627 at a cost of 83,500. Once again, this is a two-year contract that helps service um and pay for a threeerson team that support the district. And the alternative is we hire a CFO or somebody inhouse, but then on top of this, we'd be paying health care and retirement benefits. This is about a if this was to come in, and Barb, help me if I'm incorrect here, but if this was an in-house position for only one person, depending on where that came in, um, with experience and so forth, I truly believe we would be paying quite a bit more than 78,500. Okay, that's that's true. agreed with that. Love Heather. Gonna vote for this. But just bringing up that we are

091not Heather's sole client, right? She's spread about around multiple districts. So she's also She's also at Buckley. It's not quite apples to apples. Yes, apples. It's a shared resource. No, we're getting three. Just saying. Yeah. What's the negotiation process here? How do they set these rates? I haven't asked how it works. I can tell you every district is different depending on services, depending on the size of the district, depending on what they need to do. Um I think my assumption is they went through just like we do with our with our staff and we say what we need to do to operate and they feel that that's a 6% puts them in line. Also they have the same challenge that we have. They want to keep their staff and I hope they do. They also

092lose staff to other entities. Uh so they're trying to keep their staff. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm not we're on the same page here. I mean Heather's great, but again like this is 6% perom that we're going to agree to here and to say we're not getting anything more for it. I know it's inflation or whatever, but like it seems really aggressive to to ask us to lock that in. given the news that we learned about the state funding and this and the that and whatever. It's it's it's a it's a it's a more I just it to me this this one is like well wait a minute the time when you were doing that maybe is over. Can we talk about it kind of versus just do you know what I mean? Like it's like

093a it's more of a I don't I love Heather. We work with her closely in the finance committee. She's amazing. It's great. Um, and I don't like these guys showing up and saying, "Well, it's going up by six percent." Well, I think the I just doesn't feel I'm hearing that. But I think the other thing you need to keep in mind, they every district across the state right now is having the same struggles trying to guess what the budget's going to be, trying to guess what the state's going to be able to come forward with. They're in the same boat. So, we're all trying to get through this together. Um, and yes, everybody has increased cost. We have increased cost, and I I understand that. But I think for this study and where we're at

094right now, I think it would be very difficult to find what we need at this point in time. With all of the unknowns, I surely wouldn't want to go out and try to work with a new group of people. Isn't that kind of in line? Isn't an average salary raise like 3 to 5% a year? Isn't that It depends on the year. And and fine, but like if we have less money, we have less money, you know? Sure. I just mean we have to have an accountant. I just mean it seems in line, doesn't it, with like what an average I mean I don't know. Oh 6% per year is well six well per year is well and six and what I'm saying is the six is because of the administrative part right I don't

095know the health care yeah the health care costs and the uh they have increased health care costs increased retirement costs just like everybody else and they're trying to keep moving forward so we like make it a not the actual paycheck this is a one-year contract this is a two-year contract we're talking 6% increases for two years so it's going to increase by almost 15% over the next two years. It It's 6% this year and it's 6.3 the second year. Yeah. So, do we usually do this on a two-year contract? Yes, we do. Okay. I want to say we did a three-year one. No, I don't believe so. I don't think it's ever been three. I don't think it's been three view. No, I think it's only been two. It's not a bad for this reason.

096Do a one year. Um I I'm happy to take it back. I think honestly I think it's a really good deal for what we services we get and in this light I would still recommend it but I it's not up to me. I would have to go back and ask them if that's doable. I think they really set it for two years for the same reason that then they know what our initial costs are going. They know what we have to pay for for two years. It also helps the budgeting aspect. There's we're not coming back again. We could very well come back and go wow that everything tanked. Now we have to do an 8% raise. I don't know. So I think that's the reason they do two years for for us from our

097budget. We know exactly what we what we're in for for the next two years. Similarly why we do two to threeyear contracts with teachers or support staff for the very same reasons. The other thing I'd love to do is they gave us that sheet of everything, all the services that this covers and to just do our due diligence again and go through that and see if there are aspects that we could be utilizing that they do that more than Yeah. Yeah. It's a good point. Get get more out of it. Optimize what you've got. Yeah. Right. And then we could say, well, it was we got value for it or something. Yeah. I'm I will do whatever the board asks me to do. I will say having someone who understands federal programs and doing the

098grants and everything that she does that is well out of her scope and the ISD scope to support us. I and I'm sure they will continue to support us. I don't want to underestimate the value and to me 6% in this economy and everything that we're challenged with I would I I'm right back to Lockheartfield, right? No, I all I was saying is that there's a bunch of services they can provide and let's make sure we're maximizing the use of those services. So, are we saying that if we don't agree to this right now tonight that somehow having Heather would cease to exist the ISD? Well, if you don't agree to this contract, yes, we would be on our own. Now, one year, two year, that's beside the point. But if we choose not to

099move into a contract with Northwest Ed Services, we have no payroll. We have bills payable that Barb and they work very closely together. We have federal grants that we will most likely lose because they keep us ahead of the game, right? So, they're an intricral part of the operation of the district. Absolutely. But there's no like it is a black and white thing of this is the number. There is no working with them or negotiating or cutting back the services. If you cut back the services, then you're just I think I think you're really asking the question, have you cut here, you cut here? Well, who's going to pick that up? It's a system that's worked very very well. The first question I thought was very valid. Is this something that can be negotiated? I

100I think the challenge with that's going to be that then they've got to negotiate with Buckley and all the other schools where they have the same agreement. Not necessarily. I mean kind of not our problem also. Yeah. Well, I mean they can Buckley Buckley can choose to negotiate, but Sure. I just wanted to say that we got a $75,000 and that's provided tremendous amount for us for literacy has helped me file grants for after school program. I'm not picking on the district. Yeah, not picking on Heather. I'm agree. Sorry, just to come back. My argument is all right 6% this year, 6% next year. There you go. That like that is the kind of stuff we have to watch out for now. And inflation is not going to be 6% this year. So no, but

101the cost of health care and benefits has gone up. What she said, we're not necessarily talking about our idea of inflation. They're they're they have insurance costs that have gone up just like we do. They have retirement benefits that have gone up that just like we do. They can't control some of their costs either. So that's why it comes back as a 6%. Yeah. And being a newbie, I just wasn't sure. No, I I appreciate that. It's and I and I'm just trying to express I'm going to make the motion to approve the recommendation. Second. Any further discussion? No question. All those in favor? I. Any opposed? Great. Thank you. Um, anything else? I do. Okay. Sorry. I just want to take us back for a moment to the agenda and look at the special

102board meeting uh this coming Monday. It's not on your agenda, but we had earlier set it for 5:00 PM. I want to make sure that's still accurate time because you're skipping out. I will not be here. Does 5:00 PM still work? Sorry, which day? So, this Monday, June 16th, 5:00 p.m. Yes, that still works. Okay, but Amy, you won't be here. No. Will anyone else not be here? What's the subject? Um, I was that was the next point. This was our uh K12 data presentation and with our and we're going to call it a special board meeting starting off with the data presentation. Wait, are we talking about the 16th or the 14th? 16th. I'm talking about Monday the 16th from today. That's what we had prior that's what we had scheduled earlier to my

103notes, right? I just had a different subject. Okay. And I think they updated it and changed it. Okay. So now this is June 16th is data presentation. It's our data presentation. It's 20 to 8 right now. We knew this was going to be kind of a long meeting. We chose to move it to that setting. I think it would be a more informal setting and give the opportunity to ask more questions. Uh the other piece then after the data presentation, we would move to long range planning continued conversation because that's super important from a timely aspect and I'll meet with Frank tomorrow and see if we can get our long range planning committee back together this week and then if there's any opportunity for any other business, we'll go from there. Basically, right now I

104don't know if there will be because we have a meet and greet with a potential candidate, I don't know how quickly we could do that, but um anytime we get someone on the hook that's interested in working for us and it we feel it's a great fit, we surely don't want to stall that process. So um if five o'clock still works on a week from today on Monday, it'll be workshop uh format from the beginning uh with data presentation. Then we'll move to long range planning conversation and then if we need to move on any action items we'll do that at the end of the meeting. J and it'll be located where uh where what's your preference? Mine you're anyone's is this room work? Yeah from I mean the the library is fine. All right.

105High school library Ann and Matt you okay presenting maybe on the board. I won't be here to help. I think we can probably figure that out. If we can't, we can. So, this is this is this is pardon me. Oh, let's do that. That screen is nice and big. We're going to go to the elementary library. That's where the meeting will be. It's a little it's it's better for conversation and Ann can do her magic. And this is a presentation on academic data. It be K12 data be mainly academic data. Okay. Maybe some behavioral for an conversation, but the focus is academic data. Okay. And is it is this an appropriate time in your planning cycles to address some of the concerns that were raised regarding programming in the middle school curriculum scheduling that kind

106of stuff and options we might have for next year. I Matt, go ahead. What are we working on? I I think we're working on some maybe a short update on what we're what's changing or whatever to to try to address some of the concerns. We should have that. Great. It would be interesting and I don't know if it's possible but to look at when we talk about that tiered data to look at the tiers and see the growth by tier from fall to to spring, you know, as opposed to the whole class overall. If you knew you had high achievers, did they continue to grow and at what rate? And you wouldn't expect them to grow necessarily at the same rate, but whatever. be interesting. That's a good idea. Well, and keep in mind once

107again, it's only a couple data sets, but that's what we've been talking about, right? Is what's that anecdotal data that shows our kids are doing well. Um, you know, as an example, the elementary musical, you can't really put a data point to it, but can't say those kids weren't doing well. For sure. when we have a majority of our kids moving forward to secondary education. When you look at the list that Matt presented, and thank you to everyone, high school staff and middle school staff, elementary staff for getting those kids to that point. You know, those are data points that are hard to find. We'll share with you what we have. Yeah. I just want to make sure, too. I mean, that's that's a lot of information to share just a few days after school

108lets out. We're okay. the staff. That's not too big of a burden. It's better then than tonight. Well, I understand that. But is that doable with Okay. Okay. I just want to make sure it's a lot. I'm sorry, Jeeoff. Just to be clear, I was I'm not disagreeing with any of that. I'm saying we have we have other data points feedback here that we have kids who are bored in their classes and we should be looking to see if they're still as Amy suggested. Exactly. That's a great point. My my only point was there's lots of ways to look at how kids are being successful. Oh, yeah. No, for sure. Include. But we should include that one. No doubt. Yeah, I'm agree. I think we're in agreement. Okay. All right. Great. Five. It is your

109library. It looked like some of those other as we're trying to coord coordinate some of those other meeting dates via email. Just please respond to those and then all the time. Well, we could uh to that point, do we have coverage for the 12? Um, it would be great if Liz and Megan, you guys said you were available and I can get the stuff to you to present. That would be and I Matt, it's not going to be so it Liz and Megan will be the ones that come to the meeting to give. We've got retirement acknowledgement stuff and then milestone anniversary things. And I'm assuming the milestone you'll just deliver because most likely an SC will be in the classrooms or Oh, this isn't everybody all together. And no, that's you'll have to you'll

110have to do Okay, that's easier because Matt has the majority of the retirements in this building. I think this would be the milestones for elementary just to walk through and visit. Yeah. Okay. the final list. We can help you out with that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And I don't I don't mind making stops doing an earlier in the day. Okay. Thank you guys. Sounds good. Um one more call to the public. No. All right. With that, we are adjourned. Thank you. I can't remember. Okay. You did a good job.